Saturday Morning Uni Watch

By Phil Hecken, on January 4th, 2014

By Phil Hecken

Well, that was quite a week of Bowl games, wasn’t it? Some great ones and some amazing finishes, including two last night in the, ahem *Bastard Cotton Bowl* and the *Orange Bowl,* as Shipwreck would call them.

So, back for one last time this season with the lede is my Sunday Morning Uni Watch compatriot, number 2 in your program but number 1 in your hearts, TJ Duroncelet, who will give you the week’s big Bowl roundup below. In a twist, TJ has asked to give his review of the “Big 4″ (BCS Bowls) separately, since we’ve got a lot to cover today. I’ll run those in tomorrow’s post. But for now, here’s Terry with your…

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Saturday Morning Uni WatchBy Terry Duroncelet

Happy New Year!!! So yeah… bowl games left and right on New Year’s Day (as per usual). Ready to take ‘em all in along with all of this week’s games? No? Well, too bad. WE GO NAO.

Well, they certainly lived up to their name. As you can see, The United States Naval Academy Midshipmen wore their 2013 Army/Navy game helmets and jerseys with the 2011 Army/Navy game pants (the latter-most of which they’ve been wearing on-and-off for the last two seasons). An okay look, although when it comes to white/navy/navy, I prefer this. As for the Middle Tennessee State University Blue Raiders (Texas Tech’s evil twin brother school?), they wore an all-white uniform, which would’ve been alright, but they just HAAAAAD to this this thing to the helmet.

In Mack Brown’s last game as the head coach for The University of Texas (at Austin) Longhorns, they dressed as, well, Texas. White helmets and pants (two-thirds of the best all-white uniform in college football, IMO) with their signature burnt orange jerseys. And what about their opponent, the (Fighting?) Ducks of The University of Oregon? Well… it’s not bad, but I have mixed feelings about this new Pro Combat uniform. On the one hand, they might have solved the sweatbox problem with what looks to be new fabric in the abdomen area (but it’s impossible to see the sweatbox on a white uniform, so we’ll have to wait until the start of the 2014 regular season, when they’ll have more color versions of this uni). Maybe Mike was listening when I pointed out the problem a year ago. On the other hand, isn’t the point of creating a smoother/sexier/hungrier/more-flavorful uniform to cut down on the seams? I’m probably way off-base here, but there seems to be more seams the ever! And I can already see the jokes about that air channel thingy going down the middle of the jersey. The collar… um. Overall, I’m not entirely sure how to feel about this Pro Combat v5.0 (I think) suit. Maybe they’ll treat this as a prototype, and say “yeah, let’s cut back on this and that, and try again”. Oregon in green/white/white, BTW.

The Texas Tech University Red Raiders didn’t look so red on Monday. But then again, they almost never do. Anyway, they wore black/grey/black. I really dig these helmets, although the visibility of the graphics could’ve been better, and I had NO IDEA what the hell that thing was on the right side of the helmet until Paul pointed it out earlier this week (I thought it was a gremlin). I was having Detroit Lions syndrome all over again. In case you don’t know the back story, I thought that the old Lions logo was some sort of misshaped head with a big mouth and no arms (here’s a quick diagram I whipped up in MS Paint to show what I was looking at). I saw the Lions logo like that until I was about… what, 15 or 16? I’m currently 22. Yeah, I’m just as embarrassed as you think I am. Don’t have that problem nowadays. But moving on, the Arizona State University Sun Devils wore white jerseys with maroon helmets and pants. The helmets had a giant pitchfork (or is it a trident?) on one side, with a T.V. number on the other. Neat.

Oh boy, take a look at The University of California (Los Angeles) Bruins, in all of their gloomy, black glory. For the love of Corn, Celestia, football, eggnog, your pet rottweiler, or whatever deity you pray to, stop with the mess. You’re killin’ me with this costume! What ever happened to Bruin Blue and UCLA Gold? Basically, Black For Black’s Sake is the same for us here on Uni Watch as Rule 34 is for your favorite animated character in any cartoon or anime: THERE ARE NO EXCEPTIONS (I leaned that the hard way… far too many times). I mean, look at the Lakers. It’s like what Paul said about FC Barcelona not too long ago: UCLA (and the Lakers) have gone from being the most principled team(s) to being the worst. At least the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Hokies looked normal. Maroon/white/white.

The Mississippi State University (of Agriculture and Applied Science) Bulldogs wore all-maroon on Tuesday, while The William Marsh Rice University (I love saying that) Owls wore white/white/navy, all while doing their best Oregon impression.

The Duke University Blue Devils looked as blue as a designated road team can look, wearing blue/white/blue against the Texas A&M University Aggies, who wore maroon/maroon/white. Also, I saw this. A DCI jacket! EEEE!!! Okay, let’s calm down.

The University of North Texas Mean Green looked more like the Mean Black. In addition to the black tops and pants, whey also had a new helmet, which I’m neutral on. I mean, for some reason, North Texas seems like a team that can pull off BFBS, but at the same time, I’m just sitting here saying “NO”. Anyway, their opponents, (the University of Nevada [Las Vegas] Rebels) wore grey/white/grey, but added player names to their jerseys.

Another one of my favorite full names to say when doing these bowl game roundups:The Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College Tigers wore their usual gold/white/gold look, while the The University of Iowa Hawkeyes wore their usual black/black/gold look.

The University of Missouri (Columbia) Tigers… I’ll admit at first, I wasn’t too sure about their new uniforms. But BOY, have they grown on me. In fact, I would even put them in my top four best-dressed college teams (LSU, Alabama, and Tulane [when they aren’t wearing deep grey] are the other three). They did not disappoint in the uniform category in Friday night’s game, wearing black helmets, gold jerseys, and black pants. And as for their opponent (the Oklahoma State University [Stillwater] Cowboys)? They wore all-white (that star on the collar is something that they do for bowl games only, they’re little black stars with an orange ‘C’ for the captains). This was a game that proved to be the reason why we watch college football. Mizzou would win in great fashion 41-31.

That’ll do it for now. You’ll notice that the BCS bowl games weren’t mentioned here. I feel that those deserve their own mention, so you’ll be seeing those tomorrow. See you soon.

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Thanks, TJ — and thanks for your season-long uni-reporting too! Huge help to me and a great, great job all season. Take a bow, Terry, you earned it! How about a great big virtual round of applause for Mr. Duroncelet?

He’s not done folks, since there are still the Big Bowls and of course there are three more games (including the LAST BCS National Championship game) still to play.

Catherine’s Special..

Bowl Edition 5 and 1

Well, dear readers, we’ve almost come to the conclusion of another College Football Season, but that doesn’t mean the Five and One has disappeared yet.

Catherine’s back with part one (of two) of her Five Best and One Worst uni matchups of the Bowl Season. This will take care of the first half of the bowls (played through 12/31). The next set will come next weekend. Now, here’s Miss Ryan. Enjoy:

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Five & One, Bowl Edition (Part I)By Catherine Ryan

Happy (belated) 2014, UniWatchers! Here’s your 5 and 1 countdown for the first half of Bowl Season! As a reminder, here are the games that were considered for this countdown:

2. Mississippi vs. Georgia Tech
This game was simple and neither team tried anything crazy with the unis. In a season where teams tend to show up in clown costumes, I want to show appreciation for teams that keep it simple.

We have another new set of tweaks, er…concepts today. After discussion with a number of readers, it’s probably more apropos to call most of the reader submissions “concepts” rather than tweaks. So that’s that.

So if you’ve concept for any sport, or just a tweak or wholesale revision, send them my way.

Please do try to keep your descriptions to ~50 words (give or take) per image — if you have three uniform concepts in one image, then obviously, you can go a little over, but no novels, OK? OK!. You guys have usually been good with keeping the descriptions pretty short, and I thank you for that.

Like the colorizations, I’m going to run these as inline pics — click on each one to enlarge.

And so, lets begin:

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We begin today with Mark McLean, who thinks the Bills need an alt jersey:

Phil,

Now that NFL teams are regulated to using just one helmet color throughout the season it looks like the Bills won’t be doing my favorite 1990’s throwback anytime soon. So if they can’t make the helmet red, It got me thinking what a red alternate jersey would look like.

Thanks,

Mark in Buffalo

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Next up is Bryan Moss who has some new looks for the Toronto basketball team:

Phil,

My concepts for a more suitable Toronto basketball team. The Wolves. The first one is there home uniform. The second one is their away uniform. The third is the alt uni. This is for uni concepts.

Roll Tide
Bryan

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We close today with Ryan Allison with a new look for SMU Hoops:

Hey Phil,

Since SMU Basketball is looking a little bit brighter than SMU Football (Coach Larry Brown, McDonald’s All American Keith Frazier, and the signing of Emmanuel Mudiay), I have decided to submit a SMU Nike “Sweat Back” Uniform Concept. I decided to use the 1982 Pony Express era SMU football uniforms as my inspiration by matching the font treatment, number treatment, and leg striping. The “sweat back” graphic includes a picture of Dallas Hall (SMU’s most notorious building), the SMU seal, and “Est. 1911.”

Thanks,
Ryan Allison

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And that’s it for today. Back with more next time.

U.W.F.F.L. Week 18

By Rob Holecko

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It is time for the UWFFL semifinals, it’s the final four teams playing this week and the winners will advance to next week’s UWFFL Bowl XIV.

. . .

In one matchup, we have the Eastern Division Champion New York Sharks, 11-3 and the #1 seed, hosting the Wild Card Miami Cougars, who defeated San Diego in an epic wild card game 118-110 in 2OT. The Sharks swept the Cougars this year, defeating them in weeks 2 and 10, but they’ll have to beat them for a third time to get to the UWFFL Bowl. In the other semifinal we have the Central Division Champions, the Minnesota Mustangs, also 11-3 hosting wild card winner, the Detroit Demons. Detroit and Minnesota are also both from the same division, so they’ve already played each other twice this year as well, splitting the season series Minnesota winning at home in Week 8, 25 to 20, while Detroit took the rematch in Detroit in the regular season finale, 26 to 24.

We are also in the next to last week of minor league games, and there is one game that stands out above all the rest. In the Pacific Coast Conference, the top two teams face off as the Vancouver Sea Wolves (12-2 PCC, 15-3 Overall, #6 BCS) take on the Anchorage Oracs (12-2-1 PCC, 15-2-1 Overall, #3 BCS) in a game that is sure to have both Conference and National Championship implications. Not counting if any of these teams finish in the top 2 in the BCS rankings and qualify for the National Championship Game, the top four will make the PCC playoffs.

[Today’s ticker was compiled by Paul, as a special birthday present to me – PH]

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NFL News: Check out this late-’80s Raiders/Broncos footage — the Broncos didn’t have any helmet logos! Was that a preseason game? (Good find by Brian Ristau.) … Tomorrow’s Chargers/Bengals playoff game in Cincy has many fans fondly remembering the 1982 AFC Championship Game, when those same two teams met in ultra-frigid conditions — the wind chill was minus-59! I remember watching that game in our family’s living room, but Brinke Guthrie has a more vivid memory of it: “I was there at the game — in this. I hand painted that sign in the Q102 production room. At the game, it was like being on the surface of the moon.”

College Football News: For years the purple stripes and “LSU” lettering on LSU’s helmets have been very, very dark — almost black. But Dennis Couvillion says they switched to a lighter shade of purple, closer to the shade used on the jersey, for the Steakhouse Bowl. I’ve looked at a bunch of game photos and don’t really see it, but Dennis maintains that it was very easy to spot on TV. … You probably know the story of Notre Dame’s famous “green jersey game” in 1977, but here’s a new telling of it, just in case (from Warren Junium).

Hockey News: We had previously linked to Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist’s Yankees-themed mask for the team’s upcoming game at Yankee Stadium, but now it turns out he’ll also have pinstriped pads (thanks, Brinke). … Also from Brinke: The Stockton Thunder recently let the local kids paint designs on the ice, with amusing results. … Here’s a good piece on the Notre Dame hockey team’s equipment manager (from Anthony Nuccio).

College Hoops News: New suit lining designs for Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim. “I find it very interesting that Boeheim would use pictures of the Carrier Dome in his jackets, since he initially opposed the move back in 1980,” says Mike Mills. “Guess all those wins have caused him to change his mind.”

And that is going to do it for this first Saturday in the new year. I wanted to extend a big thanks to everyone who wished me a “Happy Birthday” yesterday — especially Paul — the best *boss* anyone could ever have (thanks for everything, including doing today’s Ticker)!

Big thanks (again) to Terry for all his efforts compiling the uni round-ups again this year, and also to Catherine for her penultimate 5 & 1 of the football season. You guys are ACES!

Big day of football (still) ahead today, as we kick off a hugely important game for the CorC the *Vulcan Bowl* between Vandy & Houston, followed by two pro games: Chiefs/Colts (4:35 ET) and then Saints/Eagles in the 8:10 (ET) nightcap. Plus all the assorted other games going on during the first weekend of 2014. Enjoy, and I’ll catch you guys tomorrow.

Uh…. there’s nothing to see in that Raiders/Broncos footage. The Broncos have logos, they’re just hard to see because it’s such a grainy low resolution video. Look closely at the last Bronco player as Bo’s crossing the endzone, there’s clearly a logo on his helmet.

Valjean|
January 4, 2014 at 1:29 pm |

Agreed — and good eye. The apparent lack of logos (on both sides) looks like an artifact of the horrid resolution (the whole thing looks like a copy of a copy of a copy — of VHS) and the action footage. If you pause any frame and look closely both teams have logos.

Graf Zeppelin|
January 4, 2014 at 3:10 pm |

Seconded. First of all it couldn’t be a preseason game because Bo Jackson never played in a preseason game; he would have still been with the Royals in August. Second, the Raiders didn’t play the Broncos in preseason in 1987, ’88, ’89 or ’90, the four seasons Jackson played in L.A. Third, there’s no other evidence of the Broncos ever going logo-less in a regular-season game (or a preseason game, for that matter) after 1967. (I don’t think any team has done that in preseason since the 1960s.)

Dolphins did in the 1970 Preseason and I think they may have been the last. Close enough, though, GZ.

Graf Zeppelin|
January 4, 2014 at 5:36 pm |

Now that I think of it, the Giants may have done that in ’75.

Steve Naismith|
January 4, 2014 at 6:55 pm |

Pretty sure the Browns go logo-less in the preseason.

Glenn|
January 4, 2014 at 10:10 pm |

The Broncos helmets often looked like that in that time frame, and the helmet always looked way too light, especially when they were playing (usually) road games when they wore the white jerseys in bright sunlight games. For some reason, the helmet seemed to “bleach out” in photos with that combination, especially in black & white photos from the newspapers.

Jim Y.|
January 4, 2014 at 7:30 am |

…and regarding the Marshall/Maryland game, I get the patriotic red, white & blue on Marshall’s helmet looks like crap worn with a mono-green uni, and we all understand the way Maryland rolls. But what I don’t get is why is Marshall advertising Colin Cowherd’s radio show with their wordmark?

Actually, I was the one who made the DCI mention today. And I’m definitely a fan. I literally squeed when I saw that.

Matt|
January 4, 2014 at 9:09 am |

Actually, UGA’s britches are grey and not silver. The silver britches were shiny and metallic looking. I’ve heard a rumor that UGA may be bringing the actual silver britches back soon.

Phil Hecken|
January 4, 2014 at 5:15 pm |

Yeah, and the Oakland Raiduhs also wear gray pants. Not sure we’ll be calling them the gray and black anytime soon (though their helmets are still ‘silver’).

But if you ask a Georgia fan, thems are Silver Britches.

I get what you’re saying though.

DJ|
January 4, 2014 at 10:18 am |

The SMU concept is fine; the only suggestion I’d make is to raise the Dallas Hall pattern higher on the back of the shirt (as is, it’s almost certainly tucked in under the shorts and invisible during games).

It would certainly appear that the Bronco/Raider footage has been doctored a bit. While resting between the seizures that were caused by the video’s stop-motion like quality, I was able to hit play/pause quick enough to discern the Bronco’s logo on the left side of the their helmets. The right side looked disturbingly ‘clean’…as if someone had used early versions of CGI to edit the logos off.
But then I could just need to get another copy of ‘Catcher in the Rye’ so that the helicopters will stop following me for another week or so. Dang….the aluminum foil fell off my window, I gotta go……

Graf Zeppelin|
January 4, 2014 at 3:12 pm |

It’s not doctored. It’s just a lousy copy-of-a-copy of low-resolution VHS footage. That and the lighting conditions make it look the logos are missing, but they’re not.

Of course, I love Brinke’s car. What a great day for long suffering Bengals fans.

It felt so wrong to play the next game in that antiseptic dome in suburban Detroit.

I am happy that the weather will be a factor in this year’s Super Bowl.

arrScott|
January 4, 2014 at 12:47 pm |

People who aren’t willing to sit outside for three hours in sub-zero weather aren’t actually football fans. This includes, sadly, the entire corporate leadership of the NFL. Also, judging by playoff ticket sales, most people who watch and attend NFL games.

Super Bowl games played indoors ought to have an asterisk next to them in the record books. Might as well just have the coaches play a game of foosball.

Brinke|
January 4, 2014 at 1:07 pm |

The 12-4 Niners get to play in like -50 WC at the home of an 8-7-1 team.

Something’s wrong with that logic. And yeah, weather will be a factor.

I really don’t like Ms. Catherine’s 5 and 1’s for the reason that she quite blatantly displays a dislike of Maryland. Every single time Maryland plays, they almost always end up in her “Bad” column.

Objectively they CANNOT be that bad. A solid white uniform with shadows of the state flag (not random vectors and lines) is very well put together. There is a reason why everyone in the state of Maryland loves the uniforms.

You are basically accusing Catherine of being consistent. You realize that’s a compliment, right?

Catherine’s job is to give her honest opinion. The fact that her opinion doesn’t jibe with yours (or with “everyone in the state of Maryland”) isn’t particularly relevant.

Get over YOURself.

Phil Hecken|
January 4, 2014 at 5:18 pm |

To each his (or her) own.

I happen to LOVE the white-ops (and black-ops) unis and pretty much detest anything else they put on. Some folks hate (with the exception of say, Texas) the all-white look. It’s a personal preference thing, and while I may agree less with Catherine (and even LESS with the dearly departed Jim Vilk), I respect her choices (and thought she did great this time around).

denvergregg|
January 4, 2014 at 9:44 pm |

Btw wtf happened to vilk?

Stan Bunting|
January 4, 2014 at 7:29 pm |

Catherine rocks – and she is so right about everything Maryland wears.

TJ (Simply Moono) wanted to give the Big Four Bowls a separate piece (which should run tomorrow) so I avoided any mention of that game. Last time they wore the orange pants was the 2012 Orange Bowl, and that probably was one Clemson fans (and players) would like to forget. But the history of that will be in TJ’s next writeup.

Kevin|
January 4, 2014 at 4:26 pm |

Looks like KC is wearing red white white today. Did they wear anything except red pants on the road in the regular season?

DenverGregg|
January 4, 2014 at 4:29 pm |

Most of Miss Catherine’s picks make sense, but the Syracuse pick where we’re asked to ignore the helmets strikes me as really odd. Either Wazzu/CSU or Notre Dame/Rutgers would have made more sense in that spot – maybe even OSU/Boise.

Pat|
January 4, 2014 at 4:44 pm |

Anybody else disappointed that Kansas City isn’t wearing their red pants? Perfect opportunity for a beautiful contrast game with Indy. It would have been Helmets/Jerseys/Pants/Socks White/Blue/White/Blue Indy vs Red/White/Red/White. Instead we get the all white look from the Chiefs.

Lee|
January 4, 2014 at 5:12 pm |

Absolutely disappointed KC isn’t wearing their red pants. Who made that call?
Would have been a great uniform matchup, instead it’s slightly blah.

Lee

Jacob|
January 4, 2014 at 6:08 pm |

TJ,

I always thought the same thing with the old Detroit Lions logo. Growing up in MI and a fan of the team, I could never actually see it the way it should be. Still see it that way whenever I see the old logo. I’ll agree, slightly embarrassing

Alex|
January 4, 2014 at 6:20 pm |

I’m giddy that there was a DCI mention. Drum corps and marching band uniforms never cease to geek me out. Please sir, we’d like some more!

Danimal|
January 4, 2014 at 7:07 pm |

KC looks better with the white pants. More old-school.

With their red pants they look too much like the McDonald’s company football team.

Bromotrifluoromethane|
January 4, 2014 at 8:24 pm |

I blame the Chefs choke on them wearing the white pants instead of their proper red pants. The white pants on the road looks terrible. Great googily moogily!!!

Mike|
January 4, 2014 at 11:09 pm |

I’m glad I wasn’t the only one wondering what in the hell the red blob on the Texas Tech helmet was supposed to be!

Keeping with SMU theme, cycling club jersey unveiled in October has the horizontal front vertical back. I think it works well due to the way a rider is positioned, logo placements on cycling jerseys impacted by way there are seen in varying poses (podium, arms in air, crouched in pack or from race TV helicopters)